Permaculture magazine has been in print since 1992, during which time John Adams has been writing articles about his various DIY projects. This is a collection of his most popular projects plus a selection of our favorite readers’ DIY submissions.
Mike Abbott spent most of his childhood playing in the woods around his home near Bristol. After graduating with a degree in combined science, he returned to the countryside with a variety of jobs in amenity horticulture. While attending a course in arboriculture in 1976, Mike discovered Herbert Edlin’s inspiring book Woodland Crafts in Britain. From this he made his first pole-lathe and set about rediscovering the skills that had been all but lost. Two years later he undertook a course in recreation management which included a study of the recreational potential of small woodlands. Here he developed the concept of the ‘Living Wood’; no longer just a haunt for pheasants and wildlife but an environment where people could re-establish their contact with the natural world.
After two years landscaping in Germany’s Black Forest, Mike returned to work in his home village near Bristol, supervising a youth-training scheme on a woodland restoration project. Here he was able to incorporate his new found love of woodland crafts and could see the fulfilment that this kind of work offered to his trainees. In 1985 he set up Living Wood Training with the aim of teaching green wood skills and promoting their potential. In 1989 he wrote his first book, Green Woodwork, and a year later gathered together a small group of enthusiasts to found the Association of Pole-lathe Turners which grew from a band of six in 1990 to an association of
